


A Thought on 'Love and Monsters'

by orelseatlastsheunderstoodit



Series: My Doctor Who Meta [1]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Gen, Love and Monsters, Meta
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-18
Updated: 2014-05-18
Packaged: 2019-09-30 23:53:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17233517
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orelseatlastsheunderstoodit/pseuds/orelseatlastsheunderstoodit





	A Thought on 'Love and Monsters'

Watched 'Love and Monsters' for the second time (since I’ve been introducing one of the brothers to Doctor Who) and you know what? It’s not as bad as everyone makes out. I was worried my brother was going to loathe it, you know, since it gets so much hate in the fandom. He said it wouldn’t ever be his favorite, but he didn’t hate it, seeing as ‘hate’ is a strong word.

Yes, the episode’s a bit weird. I asked my brother what he thought and he said, “It was sort of depressing,” and yeah, it is a bit. But I think it’s also hopeful.

I mean, they build their little group on a common interest in the Doctor and then move on when they discover two things: 1) other things in common, and 2) unique differences that positively contributed to the group. And all that gets destroyed when an alien wanting to absorb the Doctor masquerades as one of them.

Besides, the episode is far more character-driven than it is plot-driven, and it explores a variety of reactions and consequences of interaction with the Doctor, however minor. The episode’s themes dovetail with the overall series’ arc (how monsters and danger and loss are part of the package that includes the Doctor), and Elton mournfully muses on what price Jackie and Rose might end up paying for their interactions with the Doctor. (Also, everyone seems to love that ending quote. For an episode that gets so much hate, we sure do love that quote about the world being sadder and darker and madder and better than we think it is as kids.)

On one level, I think the episode gets hate because it makes us uncomfortable. It’s not the daft monster from Clom or the awkward joke about Elton’s and Ursula’s ‘love life’ or the Scooby-Doo chase scene. Yeah, those are uncomfortable, but what’s really disconcerting is the fact that the episode’s about us, about people from different backgrounds, from different stages in life, all coming together due to a single purpose, a single shared interest–the Doctor and the events surrounding him.

Fandom does that. We do that here on tumblr. Yeah, we’re not bringing each other baked goods or jamming out tunes together, but we support each other (like they do concerning Bridget’s daughter, or Ursula defending Elton) and we share discussions about life and about the Doctor. (Mr. Skinner talks about how the Doctor appears to be a mix of various archetypes, Bridget traces the appearance of the TARDIS throughout history, and Bliss makes fan art attempting to show what the Doctor is or could be or could ever not be (or something like that).

What mucks it up isn’t the Doctor (for once). As Elton points out, “It’s not his fault.” Their downfall begins when the Absorbaloff (in the guise of Victor Kennedy) shows up and takes over. He’s the one obsessed with finding the Doctor. He’s the one who forces the others to revert back to relentlessly searching for the Doctor; he’s the one who sucks out all the fun of them getting together in community. He destroys their community, and they don’t stand up to him until it’s too late to save the community.

Unfortunately, sometimes we do that to each other, too. Elton comes to the realization that his search for the Doctor pales in comparison to what he feels for Ursula; it’s why he decides that he’s fine with just pizza and the telly with Jackie. Elton learns–a bit too late–that real community is better than anything, even finding answers that only the Doctor could give him. Yes, stories matter, but real life is so much more than just watching Doctor Who and ships and writing meta or fic or both or doing whatever in celebration of the fiction we enjoy.

There’s nothing wrong in enjoying or engaging with something (I mean, I’m doing it as I write this), but when it crosses into obsession, real people can get hurt. That doesn’t mean we can’t voice our opinions, or make theories or speculation, or criticize or point out flaws–we can do those things, and we must criticize and engage with the material, we must point out the problematic and grapple with it. We can have fun. But, just as LINDA could allow for Mr. Skinner’s stories and Bridget’s cooking or Bliss’ art, we need to be safe and supportive as a community. People are more important than whatever we’re watching (or reading or whatever), and if what we’re doing is so self-absorbed that we’re treading on others, erasing actual people, then we’ve crossed the line. In that moment, we’re Victor Kennedy, we’re the Absorbaloff, and that is someone we clearly do not want to be.

Let’s not be Victor Kennedy, so self-absorbed that he didn’t care what happened to the community he strode into. Let’s not be the Absorbaloffs in any of the fandoms we belong to, sucking the fun out of the community. Let’s be like members of LINDA before Kennedy showed up and spoiled the whole thing.

So, yeah, the episode is one of the most hated, apparently. But I think it’s more because it points out uncomfortable things and causes us to look at things from a different perspective. I don’t hate the episode–it’s not the greatest, plotwise; it’s rather predictable in one sense (Kennedy showed up, asked Bliss to stay behind, and my brother goes, “He’s evil, isn’t he?” and then Bliss screamed)–but it does what I think is one of Who’s strengths: it made me think. And so I can’t hate it.  
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So I wrote the above in 2014 on my second watch of “Love and Monsters” and from conversations crossing my dash, I thought I might reblog it for some thought and maybe some discussion. 

I guess the only thing I’d change is awkward to terrible in the fifth paragraph. Otherwise, more than a year later (almost two years later, actually), I still stand by it. We shouldn’t be so obsessed with something that we trample over other people, make them conform to what we want; we should build the community up, not tear it down.


End file.
